


The Sisters Black

by Netgirl_y2k



Series: The Women of the Night's Watch [1]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Family, Female Friendship, Gen, Women Being Awesome
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-03
Updated: 2014-03-08
Packaged: 2018-01-07 08:51:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 12,167
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1117936
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Netgirl_y2k/pseuds/Netgirl_y2k
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Night gathers, and now my watch begins. It shall not end until my death. I shall take no husband and bear no children. I shall wear no gowns and no jewels. I shall live and die at my post. I am the sword in the darkness. I am the watcher on the walls. I am the shield that guards the realms of men. I pledge my life's blood to the Night's Watch, for this night and all the nights to come.</i>
</p><p>-The Sisterhood of the Night's Watch</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Winterfell

Lyanna Stark managed to visit Winterfell perhaps twice a year, and different members of the household regarded her through different eyes. 

To Lord Eddard she was always and forever his beloved younger sister; but she was also the cause of a stain on the honor of House Stark, a stain that would outlast even Robb's lordship.

To Jon Snow she was a much needed reminded that although he was bastard born, he wasn't motherless, unwanted, or unloved. 

To Sansa her Aunt Lyanna had always been a figure of great and tragic romance. She had been the beloved of a prince and a great lord both, and catalyst to a civil war that had nearly ended the Targaryen dynasty. True, the cost had been nearly twenty years of exile at the end of the world, and the knowledge that her only son was growing up without her. But the songs that Sansa had grown up on only talked about the romance, never the price paid.

To Robb and Theon Lyanna was a woman who, bewilderingly enough, wielded a lance better than either of them.

Arya couldn't have been more than five the first time she recalled seeing her aunt leap down from one of the shaggy-coated, hardy mounts that they rode beyond the Wall, dressed all in black, and wearing a longsword on her back. 

In that moment Arya Stark had decided that her future lay on the Wall, dressed all in black.

*

Lyanna Stark arrived at Winterfell unexpectedly, about a month before she would usually have been looked for. Fortunately, Arya happened to have been looking from her chamber window at the time, and she was able to intercept her aunt just as she was dismounting. 

"You promised we would talk about it once I was older."

"And we will," said Lyanna.

"I'm five-and-ten," said Arya. "That's old enough."

"Arya..." Lyanna pushed her hair - which had once been black before life at the Wall had threaded it with grey - back from her face. 

"You can't stop me from taking the black," insisted Arya.

" _I_ can't," agreed Lyanna, taking her horse's reins and leading him towards the stables, leaving Arya behind. "But your father can."

Arya fought down the urge to stamp her foot into the slush of Winterfell's yard; she scrambled after her aunt and took the reins from her hands. "He'll let me go if you ask him. I belong on the Wall; I'm ready to take your vows."

"You're too young to know that. Even I didn't swear my vows until I was nearing twenty." 

"Robb's going to be lord of Winterfell someday, and Jon will always have a place by his side. Bran's squiring for the Blackfish at Riverrun, and father is talking about sending Rickon away to be fostered soon. Sansa is to be married, there's a Tyrell here asking for her hand--"

"Which Tyrell?" asked Lyanna with mild interest, waving off the approaching groom as Arya began to unsaddle her mount.

"Lady Margaery--" Lyanna raised an eyebrow at Arya "--on behalf of her brother Willas, apparently. You wouldn't catch me marrying a man who sent his sister to court me."

"No, I would imagine not."

"All the others have their place, I don't. Mother's always saying that she doesn't know what's to become of me. I could belong at the Wall, I could be valuable there."

"Arya, it's not that simple. You're too young to know what you'd be giving up. You'd never be allowed to wed--"

"I don't want to marry some stupid lordling who smells like roses; I'm not _Sansa_." 

"You'd never have a babe of your own."

"I don't want any babes."

"You might, if you knew--" began Lyanna, just as Jon entered the stables and said softly, " _Mother_."

Arya had enough sense to allow mother and son a moment to greet each other alone, and she made to slip past them. Lyanna halted her for a moment, squeezing her shoulder. 

"I'll talk to Ned," she said, without taking her eyes off Jon, "but I'm making no promises."

*

Arya missed Bran. If her brother hadn't gone south determined to win his spurs she might have asked him to scale the wall outside their father's solar and report the conversation going on within back to her. It would have been an easy climb for Bran.

As it was, Arya had slipped soft-footed in the shadows past Jory Cassel, and she would have to hope that nobody came upon her lying flat on her belly with her ear pressed to the crack under her father's door.

"Ned, you can't actually be considering this--" that was her lady mother, who Arya hadn't expected to be easily reconciled to the idea.

"House Stark has sent daughters to the Wall before. Sons too, back when the Watch still wanted them--" her lord father sounded undecided.

"Well, the Tullys of Riverrun haven't. And in case you've both forgotten: you didn't volunteer to take the black, Lyanna, you were exiled as a traitor to the realm!" 

"I remember, Lady Catelyn," said Lyanna stiffly. "And if I hadn't agreed to take the black and be separated from my son, all the while swearing to the old gods and the new that my brothers would have had every reason to believe me forcibly abducted by Rhaegar, then this entire family would have been exiled across the Narrow Sea, if not executed outright." 

"Lyanna, Cat--" father sounded weary, as though this was not the first time this argument had been fought "--we are discussing Arya's future, not our past."

"Lyanna--" her mother's voice had an edge of desperation to it, and Arya felt a twinge of guilt at being the cause of it "--surely you would rather have been at Winterfell with your son than alone on the Wall? You can't want that for Arya."

"Of course I would rather have been watching Jon grow; but Arya is not me, she is not you, and she is most certainly not Sansa. She will never be happy as some man's wife, but I think she might do well in the Watch. And for what it might be worth, I was never alone on the Wall, and nor would Arya be."

Before she could hear anything further a boot nudged Arya in the ribs, and she rolled away into a crouch. She looked up to find Jory Cassel giving her a stern look, and nodding pointedly back along the hall away from the solar. 

Arya hopped silently to her feet and headed back down to supper quite cheerful; from what she'd managed to overhear the discussion seemed to be going her way. 

*

"Six months?" asked Arya; both delighted because she was to be allowed to take the black, and despairing because _six months_.

"You'll be six-and-ten then," said Lyanna. "Your mother and father agree that it's old enough, and I'll be down from the Wall again, so if you still want to take the black then--"

"I will!"

" _If_ you still want to take the black, you can return with me then."

*

Arya would have expected Sansa to be happier at the prospect of soon being rid of her, instead she acted as though having a sister in the Night's Watch was going to be a source of the greatest shame; Arya obviously did not cut quite so romantic a figure as Lyanna did. 

"I know a song about the Night's Watch," said Sansa nastily. "It's called Brave Danny Flint."

"I know a pretty one," said Margaery Tyrell, who was wearing a blue rose in her hair and was ever to be found at Sansa's side. "It's about Rhaenyra Targaryen being sent to the Wall after the Dance of the Dragons. She was the first woman in the Night's Watch, was she not?"

"First lady commander too," Arya answered with a grin. 

*

Arya had been given a biography of Rhaenyra Targaryen as a nameday gift one year. She'd spent much of her time pouring over it when she was supposed to be at her other studies, much to the frustration of Septa Mordane. She knew the story well: Rhaenyra Targaryen, the woman who had come closest of all to becoming queen regent of the Seven Kingdoms, sent to the Wall after her defeat in the civil war known as the Dance of the Dragons, her enemies had doubtless expected her to meet the same fate as Danny Flint. 

Instead Rhaenyra had become the first lady commander of the Night's Watch, she gave battle to the king-beyond-the-wall more than once, and drove him to live out his days in hiding in the Frostfangs. 

After her, men and women both served in the Night's Watch, sometimes together, sometimes kept strictly segregated at different forts. It was only in the last hundred years or so that only women had taken the black. 

*

"It's because boys are too important to waste on guarding the kingdoms against grumpkins and snarks," said Rickon, attempting to batter Arya with his own wooden sword.

Arya stepped past her little brother's wild swing and pushed him down into the slush of the training yard. "You'd cry if you saw a grumpkin or a snark," she informed him. 

When Arya turned away Rickon leapt up, tackled her around the knees, and sent them both sprawling into the mud. He then stuffed as much slush as he could down Arya's tunic before she succeeded in knocking him off. 

*

Arya was throwing out her dresses and skirts when Jon Snow knocked at her chamber door.

"Does your lady mother know you're doing that?" he asked. 

"I'm not going to need any of them at the Wall, am I."

"You aren't going for five months yet," said Jon. "But speaking of early going away presents: I had Mikken make this for you."

The blade Jon produced from behind his back was long and slender; not a true shortsword as anyone would recognise it, but it was true steel and deadly all the same. 

"It won't cut a wildling's head off," said Jon, "but it will poke him full of holes if you're quick enough."

"I can be quick," Arya promised.

"I know you can," said Jon, "and you'll be quicker still by the time I'm through with you."

"You're going to train me?"

Jon offered Arya the hilt of the sword with a mock bow, like a squire offering a knight his weapon. "I'll not have my mother say that I sent you to her completely unprepared."

*

Arya Stark was not the only daughter of the north taking the black at this time.

Lyanna Stark returned to Winterfell the long way round, by way of White Harbor and Bear Island, and she brought with her Wylla Manderly and Lyanna Mormont, both new recruits to the Watch. 

But before Arya could get to know her new sisters she must first say farewell to her old one. 

Sansa was leaving Winterfell too - for Highgarden and a betrothal to Willas Tyrell, and although Arya may be able to visit Winterfell someday, and mother and father, and Jon and Robb with it...there was unlikely to be any reason for a black sister to travel so far from the Wall as Highgarden. 

"Don't get killed, and don't get stolen by wildlings, and don't embarrass Aunt Lyanna," Sansa commanded.

"Don't--" Arya tried to think of some danger that might threaten Sansa in the Reach "--don't prick your fingers on any roses."

Margaery Tyrell gave a bell-like laugh at that, and Arya turned on her, "And _you_ , you look after her."

Margaery and Sansa shared a secret smile, and Margaery snaked her arm through Sansa's, "Like she's my own sweet sister, I promise."

The embrace Sansa and Arya shared was brief, but as it was also their first one since they'd been little more than babes it was sweet too.

*

Arya would not be taking a trunk, and much like Wylla and Young Lyanna her packs were not heavy. Life at the Wall did not require much in the way of possessions.

Jon asked her at least three times if she'd remembered Needle - he'd insisted she name her sword, all the best blades had names and stories behind them, he'd said - the last time he asked she'd been wearing it on her hip.

Arya threw her arms around Jon's middle and said, "I wish you were coming with us."

Jon held her for a long moment before he said, "Then who would protect Robb, and keep Theon and Rickon out of mischief?"

Arya barked out a laugh, and used her sleeve to scrub her eyes of the tears she wouldn't have let anyone but Jon see.

*

The morning of her departure Arya was summoned to her mother's chambers, where she found herself hugged so fiercely that she half suspected a plot to keep her in Winterfell by means of a broken rib. 

Later, in the courtyard, Lady Catelyn confined herself to the same speech she'd made when Bran had gone off to squire for Uncle Brynden: she told Arya to be brave and careful, to remember that she was a Stark and a Tully, and that she'd always have a place at Winterfell.

And when they rode from the castle Arya forced herself to keep her mount moving and her eyes on the Kingsroad, because she knew that if she looked back she would be lost.

Aunt Lyanna pulled her horse up to walk next to Arya's. "I didn't want to leave Winterfell either," she said.

"That was different," said Arya. "You were leaving Jon, and you didn't have a choice."

"And you do have a choice," said Lyanna in a gentle voice.

"No, I don't," Arya said stubbornly, and spurred her horse into a canter to catch up with Wylla Manderly and Lyanna Mormont. 

*

"Grandfather always said that all I was good for was the Night's Watch or the Silent Sisters, and I don't think life with the Silent Sisters would have agreed with me--" Wylla Manderly had bushy blonde eyebrows, her hair was dyed a sickly shade of green, and she talked so much that the Silent Sisters probably would have been forced to gag her before a week was out "--and so here I am; even if I'm the only one without a famous relative in the Watch."

Lyanna Mormont - who'd introduced herself as Lya; so as not to cause any confusion, she'd said, which had caused the older Lyanna to raise her eyebrows and say that nobody would be mistaking Lya for a sister of the Night's Watch, never mind a ranger, quite yet - threw a twig at Wylla and said, "Shut up, it's not my fault my mother's lady commander."

"Is it true all the girls in your family have taken the black?" Arya asked. 

"Oh, yes. Mother went after I was weaned. My sister Alysane not long afterwards, she's second in command at Eastwatch-by-the-Sea now. Then Lyra, and Jorelle only last year. I'm the last. Well, except for Dacey, but she's the eldest, so she's stuck on Bear Island as castellan while Cousin Jorah's in King's Landing." Lya managed to make it sound like her sister Dacey had gotten the mucky end of the stick. "She'll probably end up inheriting anyway; Dacey says Jorah's too busy pining after his little princess to marry and produce an heir of his own." 

"Princess Rhaenys?" Wylla asked. "I met her and her brother once when they visited White Harbor."

"No," said Lya, "the other princess, King Rhaegar's sister--"

Arya's attention was grabbed my movement in the corner of her eye. She looked to the side just quickly enough to see her Aunt Lyanna rise up from her bedroll and walk quickly and quietly away from their fire.

"Shut up!" she ordered the other new recruits.

*

The next morning Arya rode beside her Aunt Lyanna, feeling oddly guilty even though she hadn't been the one to bring up Rhaegar. Back in Winterfell the royal family were never spoken of; even Sansa had learned at a young age not to ask about the possibility of a royal visit, or to question why she would never be invited to King's Landing to serve as lady-in-waiting to one of the princesses, as a highborn maid might expect.

"I talked to Jon before I left--" Arya had already proudly shown Lyanna the sword Jon had ordered forged for her "--I told him I wished he was coming with us. Why couldn't he? I mean, why did they stop allowing men in the Watch?"

It was after a long pause that Lyanna said, "It's a long story-- ever since the days of Rhaenyra more women than men have taken the black."

"Why?"

"Not all those who take the black are like you and your friends." Lyanna nodded to Wylla and Lya, riding ahead of them.

"We're not that alike," Arya protested. "Wylla has green hair!"

"You are all highborn girls of good families who are taking the black by choice; that isn't true of all, or even most of the women on the Wall. Boys, even baseborn boys, almost always have a better choice; I know I'm glad that Jon does."

"He will always have a place by Robb's side," Arya said loyally.

"For a long time the only men coming to the Wall were those who'd been given the choice between that and gelding, it caused... difficulties. We work better when it's just us women. And there are those--"

"Southroners," Arya supplied. 

"Not all southroners, and not all men either," said Lyanna, "but there are those who see guarding the Wall as pointless, thankless work: women's work."

*

They claimed a night's shelter at Last Hearth, having skirted around the Dreadfort. Arya was too young to remember the days before the Boltons were wardens of the North, but she had overheard her father and Uncle Benjen talking of it often enough to share their offence and sense of wounded pride. 

Smalljon Umber drank deeply and cheerfully offered to give all three of the girls a night they'd remember before they swore off men for life. 

Lyanna, just as cheerfully, said that she'd geld him if he made such an offer again; this caused all the Umbers, including the Smalljon, to laugh uproariously.

*

When they cleared the forest that had eclipsed their view, and got their first look at the Wall, Arya pulled up her mount and stared in disbelief. Wylla and Lya did the same.

"Come on," commanded Lyanna, "no time for sight seeing, we've still got three days ride to Castle Black."

Numbers had always been more Arya's friend than Sansa's, but she couldn't force her mind to accept the size of the Wall. If it appeared this tall from three days journey away, how tall was it if you were standing directly beneath it?

There was only one way to find out. Arya spurred her horse into a gallop and shouted over her shoulder, "Last one to Castle Black is stupid!"


	2. Castle Black

Arya, Wylla, and Lya took a circular room in the Silent Tower to share.

There was so much empty space at Castle Black that they might easily have had a chamber each, but upon arrival they had clustered together in a manner that had prompted one of the sisters standing watch to comment on their resemblance to frightened ducklings.

In other circumstances this remark might have caused Arya to stubbornly separate herself from her new friends, to prove that she wasn't frightened and that she didn't need them. But up close the Wall was even taller than Arya had expected it to be, and from directly underneath it seemed to have no end, vanishing straight into the grey and overcast sky above. It was dirty and cracked and weeping in the weak afternoon sunlight, and Castle Black's collection of crumbling towers and keeps looked like they'd been smashed up against it and left to go to wrack and ruin.

So Arya had stayed close to Wylla and Lya and allowed her Aunt Lyanna to call out to the guardswoman, "I'd watch my tongue if I were you, one of these ducklings is none other than the She-Bear's daughter."

"What, another one?" the guard had called back, not waiting for a response before she waved them through.

In any case, all three of them had shared bedchambers with their older sisters when they were younger, and they had quickly become used to one another's company. As they unpacked their meagre possessions they assured each other that this was why they'd chosen to stay together, and not because of nerves, or because the Wall was more intimidating than they'd expected.

Lyanna, who had briefly vanished to see to her own business, returned and offered to escort them to the common hall to fill their bellies. As soon as they entered the hall Arya felt the heat; it was the roaring fire in the grate, the cook fires, and what must have been at least a hundred of Castle Black's women packed onto benches, eating and talking. Still chilled from the outside, and hot and cold all at once, Arya settled for removing her gloves and stuffing them through her belt.

The volume of conversation dropped off as the sisters turned to take in the new arrivals. Arya felt suddenly self-conscious. There had been Sansa, of course, and her mother, and intermittently her Aunt Lyanna, but Arya had always preferred the company of Jon, and her brothers, and the other boys of Winterfell. Now, with a hundred women staring at her it struck Arya how rarely in her life had she been in the exclusive company of women.

The women of the Watch were of all ages and shapes, and from all over the Seven Kingdoms, and they were eyeing the three recruits with expressions that ranged from curiosity to pity to vindictive anticipation. The only thing that united them was that they were all dressed head to toe in black.

"You can see why people call them crows, can't you?" whispered Wylla.

"Us," Lya corrected her before Arya could. "They call _us_ crows."

Lyanna paid less than no attention to the gaping of their audience, she strode through the common hall calling out friendly greetings to sisters she knew. The three girls had little choice but to push after her, trying not to trip over anyone's boots or trailing black cloaks.

The woman serving the food was ancient and wizened, with stooped shoulders and a face like a spoiled apple. It somehow hadn't occurred to Arya that there would be old women in the Watch, although of course there must be; you were here for life.

The crone scowled at Lyanna through her wrinkles as she dished out a bowl of stew. "Back again? Gods know that if they'd given me the chance to leg it from the Wall when I was still young enough to run I'd have been halfway to Dorne before they caught me."

Arya scowled; her Aunt Lyanna would _never_ have run away from the Wall, and this crone shouldn't be implying that she ought to have.

But Lyanna just smiled and said, "But they _would_ have caught you in the end, Megga. I've brought--"

"Fresh meat," said Megga, looking the girls over with a snort. "I ought to put the three of you in a stew; green as summer grass, every one of you."

Chuckling to herself, Megga dished out three more bowls of watery stew along with a hunk of stale bread each, and Lyanna led them to a half-empty bench.

"What's in this?" Wylla asked, letting something grey and stringy slither off her spoon and land back in the bowl with a gentle splat.

"First rule of life in the Night's Watch," said Lyanna, taking a hearty swallow of the stew, "eat whatever is put in front of you, and never ask what's in it. Megga's been the cook at Castle Black since before I arrived, and her cooking has never improved. In fact," she added with a grimace, "I think it's actually getting worse."

Arya took a hesitant mouthful - the stew tasted much how it looked; grey, tasteless, and slightly slimy - Wylla and Lya followed her example.

The volume of conversation in the common hall had almost returned to its former volume now that the newcomers were no longer standing by the door to be gawped at. Then the doors swung open again admitting a gust of cold wind and with it two women. The elder woman was short with steel grey hair, in her layers of fur, wool, and boiled leather - all of which were black - she was almost broader than she was tall. The second woman was lanky with black hair that had been roughly hacked off around her jaw.

In addition to falling quiet the black sisters all rose, with varying degrees of urgency or resentment, to their feet. The woman with the steel grey hair waved them down, and they both made their way directly to where Arya was still standing with her friends and her aunt.

"My lady," said Lyanna.

"Lyanna," said the grey haired woman, "welcome back."

"Stark," the woman with the choppy black hair addressed Lyanna shortly, and her eyes were cold when they met Lyanna's

"Mya," Lyanna replied evenly. "Girls, may I present Maege Mormont, lady commander of the Night's Watch--"

Arya didn't know if sisters of the Night's Watch were expected to bow or curtsy or what, so she settled for bowing her head and saying, "My lady." Wylla followed suit, and Lya did nothing except stare at Lady Maege with wide eyes.

Lyanna continued, "And Mya Stone, first ranger out of the Shadow Tower. These are the new recruits I was collecting: Wylla Manderly of White Harbor; mine own niece, Arya Stark of Winterfell; and Lyanna Mormont of Bear Island."

Lady Maege's gaze landed on Lya and lingered-- "Young Lyanna, of course. Your sister wrote for me to expect you."

"Mother," said Lya, holding the lady commander's gaze for a long moment before breaking and fumbling in the folds of her cloak. "I have another letter from Dacey here for you--"

"You may bring it to the Lord Commander's Tower in an hour. First of all, Stark, I need to speak with you."

"Of course, my lady." Lyanna made to follow Lady Maege from the hall. "Remember what I said about the stew," were her parting words, and the girls sat down to follow her advice, although Lya seemed to have lost her appetite.

*

"Shouldn't it be called the Lady Commander's Tower?" asked Wylla, an hour later when they were loitering outside the Lord Commander's Tower in the dwindling daylight.

Lya ignored her completely; she was looking slightly stricken at the prospect of a meeting with her mother. This had confused Arya, until she'd remembered that while Jon loved his mother, and had lived for her visits to Winterfell, he had always looked a little heartsick in the days leading up to her arrival. And that was different, Aunt Lyanna hadn't chosen to leave Jon.

"I mean--" continued Wylla "--there hasn't been a lord commander in nearly a hundred years."

Arya grunted a response, too caught up in wondering what the lady commander might have wanted to talk to her aunt about. She was looking up, trying to figure out which window led to the lady commander's solar, and if there might be a way to scale the wall unnoticed; Sansa had always told her that she was too nosy for her own good.

It was then that the tower door opened, Lyanna emerged, and Lady Maege called Lya in; Wylla offered her an encouraging smile, and Arya bumped her companionably with her shoulder.

Lyanna told Wylla to go on ahead, that she wished to talk to Arya alone. The green haired girl shot Arya a discontented look, but headed back towards the Silent Tower, and Lyanna steered Arya in the direction of the winch-lift and the Wall.

*

As Arya took her first step atop the Wall her cloak was caught by a gust of freezing wind and she went down hard on one knee onto the gravel embedded ice.

Lyanna said nothing, but her lips quirked up as she took hold of Arya's elbow and tugged her to her feet. Arya scowled and shook off Lyanna's grip. She walked to the edge of the Wall and looked over, just to prove that she could. All the same, she was glad that it was her aunt, and not her friends, who'd seen her stumble.

Lyanna pointed into the distance, at something that was little more than a blur, dark as it was getting. "The Frostfangs, you'll be able to see them more clearly on a brighter day; and just shy of them is the Fist of the First Men. The Shadow Tower is to your west, and if you walked east from here in a straight line you'd reach Eastwatch and the Bay of Seals." Lyanna nodded over the edge of the Wall. "Down there is the Haunted Forest. We oughtn't let it grow so close; wildlings use it as cover for scaling the Wall."

"Are they so bad, then," Arya asked, "the wildlings?" She was still feeling dizzy from her first look down from atop the Wall, and she remembered Rickon teasing her about grumpkins and snarks; people didn't build a wall this high to protect them from fairytale monsters, they built it to keep out something _real._

Lyanna was quiet for a long moment. "Not most of them, no. But some--" She turned and led Arya to her left, to where a shed had been erected as shelter for the watchers on the Wall, it was empty now and there was a fire burning low inside it. Once they were out of the wind Lyanna continued, "There's one raider, he calls himself the Weeper, he's been climbing over the Wall more and more these last few months. He kidnaps women, rapes them, and plucks their eyes out."

Arya swallowed. "But he wouldn't--?"

Lyanna shook her head. "If any of these men wished for a woman who would fight back they'd stay north of the Wall and try to steal themselves a spearwife, and there isn't a sister in the Night's Watch who hasn't been trained to arms, at least a little."

But Lyanna had misread Arya's worry; she had her Needle and Jon Snow had taught her well how to wield it. It was almost impossible to imagine any wildling managing to breach Winterfell's walls, never mind escaping without running afoul of Jon, her father, or Robb, but Arya still found herself glad that Sansa was safely in the south with Margaery Tyrell.

Arya found Needle's hilt in the folds of her cloak, and announced, "I'd kill him."

In the dim light of the hut Arya could just about make out her aunt's frown. "It was the Weeper that Lady Maege wished to discuss with me. Mya Stone and I are to lead a ranging beyond the Wall to see if we can't find him and stop him."

"I could come!"

"Arya--"

"I could. I have a sword and I know how to use it. I know I could kill the Weeper if I met him."

"Arya, you've not yet been at the Wall a full day, you've taken no vows."

"But--"

"That's enough," snapped Lyanna, then she sighed, and reached out to cup Arya's cheek. "Megga was right about one thing, niece of mine, you're as green as summer grass."

"Am not!" Arya huffed.

"You are," Lyanna said, not unkindly, letting her hand slip from Arya's face, "and I wish I could keep you that way for a little longer. Alas. You may make a fine ranger someday, Arya, but it will be when Brienne of Tarth says that you can use that fine sword that you're so proud of to her satisfaction, and not before."

Lyanna turned and left the warming shed, Arya on her heels. "Be careful of that Mya Stone," Arya said stubbornly, "I saw the way she looks at you, she hates you."

Lyanna actually laughed at that. "Mya may not like me much, but she is my sister as much as any of the women on the Wall, just as much as Sansa is yours. I've no need to be careful of her."

The winch-lift was in use bringing fresh sisters up to the Wall so that those who'd already stood their watch could find their beds, so Arya followed Lyanna to the switchback stair. Feeling curious about whatever history it was that her aunt had with Mya Stone, Arya asked, "Why doesn't she like you?"

Lyanna slowed her steps to allow Arya to walk abreast with her. They descended in silence for a long moment before Lyanna said, "She's Robert Baratheon's baseborn daughter. Robert was--"

"The man you were supposed to marry, before--" Arya wasn't entirely clear on all the romantic entanglements of that time before she was born. Sansa would have known, though.

"Yes. I begged for your father's life, did he ever tell you that? He lost the North, but not Winterfell or his head. Mya believes that if I had begged for her father with the same passion he would still be alive, and she would not have been forced to take the black, the bastard daughter of a traitor."

"Is she right?" Arya asked.

"Mayhap, but I knew Robert well, and Mya overestimates how much interest he would have spared for her. And while Rhaegar and Jaime Lannister may have been pulling his strings by that point, it was still Aerys on the Iron Throne, and the Mad King was literal minded; it was called Robert's Rebellion, nor Eddard's Rebellion, that was the only reason I managed to save Ned." Lyanna let out a tired sigh. "But the harsh truth is that it simply never occurred to me to ask for Robert's life, not when Jon and my brothers were at stake." Lyanna shook her head, pulling herself out of the past. She smiled sideways at Arya and said, "You've no reason to fear for me with Mya, she would have been a great loss to the Watch in another life, the woman is a born ranger."

"When will you leave?" Arya asked.

"At first light tomorrow," Lyanna replied. "I expect I'll be back before you take your vows, but if I'm not--"

"Aunt Lyanna," began Arya, trying her best to strangle the childish whine that was creeping into her voice. "I'm not going to change my mind."

" _If_ you change your mind, then tell Lady Maege, she will arrange for you to travel back to Winterfell." Arya gaped at her aunt, appalled that Lyanna had suggested to the lady commander that Arya might not be sincere in her wish to take the black. Lyanna caught Arya's expression and said, "Don't worry, Lady Maege has made the same offer to each of her own daughters."

"Why are you so sure I'll want to leave?" Arya asked. True, the Wall seemed a harsh place, but no more than Arya could take, and no worse that being married off to some man who would expect her to bear his sons and never allow her to swing a sword again.

Lyanna stopped on a landing and regarded Arya seriously. "Rhaegar offered to release me from my vows once; to bring me to King's Landing, and to legitimise Jon."

"Jon would rather be a Snow than a Targaryen," insisted Arya fiercely, who prided herself on knowing her cousin as well as anybody. She had no wish to hurt her aunt, so she didn't add that Jon would far rather have been a Stark than a Snow.

Lyanna smiled wistfully. "My stubborn northern son. But I'll never forgive myself for denying him the chance to grow up a prince."

Arya frowned at that. "Then why didn't you...?"

" _Release me from my vows_ ," Lyanna said, meaningfully. "By the time Rhaegar was king and in a position to offer such things I had already sworn my life to the Night's Watch. I wasn't about to be the first Stark since the Night's King to forswear myself, not after I'd already made the realm bleed once-- I only want you to understand how serious these vows are, once you've taken them it's too late for any other life."

"I do understand," Arya promised.

"I must go and prepare for my departure. You and your friends should get some rest, your training starts in earnest tomorrow."

"Aunt Lyanna," Arya called after her aunt, who was already halfway down the final flight of stairs. Lyanna looked back and met Arya's eyes. "If the king had offered to let you down from the Wall before you'd sworn your vows, would you have gone?"

Lyanna held Arya's gaze for a long moment before she said, "In a heartbeat."


	3. Basic Training

Arya was a Stark, and she had winter in her bones. At least, so she'd thought before coming to the Wall. 

She forced herself out from the cocoon of her bedclothes and into the chill of her shared room in the Silent Tower. Arya urged her stiff fingers to dig through the pile of black clothes that she'd left heaped by her bed; she surfaced with smallclothes, breeches and tunic, quilted doublet and black ringmail shirt - which Brienne had her wearing at all times so she became accustomed to the weight of it - boots, gloves, and an oversized fur lined cloak. 

After more than a moon's turn on the Wall Arya could go from huddling under her blankets to upright and dressed in five layers of clothing in under a minute. 

It was of some comfort to her that Wylla, at least, was suffering as much as she was. Winter's claws didn't reach so far south as White Harbor, and Winterfell had been built over natural hot springs, which warmed its walls. 

Bear Island, on the other hand, lay in the Bay of Ice, and the seat of House Mormont was little more than a keep of fine timber. 

Lya Mormont grinned at her shivering friends. "You think this is bad, you just wait -- when winter comes in earnest all three of us will be huddled like puppies under every blanket we can find trying to keep warm."

"That must be how those rumours about the women of the Night's Watch got started," Arya jested. 

In fact, she hadn't heard anything of such rumours before Sansa had told her of them, which had seemed to Arya to be a bit rich coming from a girl who swooned at Margaery Tyrell's every word.

Wylla rolled her eyes. "Seven Hells. I don't like either of you _that_ much," she said, but there was no real pique in her voice. 

Whatever resentment Wylla had felt at both her friends having famed older relatives in the Watch had disappeared after several weeks of shared hardship and freezing temperatures. Of course, the fact that Arya's Aunt Lyanna was as much infamous as she was famous, and ranging beyond the Wall as well, had probably gone some way to encouraging Wylla's change of heart. Not to mention how it had quickly become obvious that Lya did not want, and was not likely to receive, any advantage from being the lady commander's daughter.

Arya pulled her second boot on and stamped her feet to get the blood flowing. "Come on, I'm starving," she said.

The most important lesson they'd learned in the last few weeks was that while Megga's cooking was indeed terrible, there was nothing like a bowl of her porridge in the morning to put some warmth into your bones.

*

After they had broken their fast Arya, Wylla, and Lya spent the rest of the morning counting turnips at the lady steward's order. 

After Bran rode south to squire for their mother's uncle Brynden Blackfish he had written home, he'd said that as a squire he had expected to spend all his time training at arms and preparing for knighthood; instead he'd found that squires spent much of their time scouring arms and armour, cleaning up after knights and horses alike, and running errands.

If Arya got the chance to write to her brother at Riverrun she would tell him that things were much the same in the Night's Watch. 

"Are you going to write to your families, then?" Arya asked. "Is it even allowed before we've said our vows?"

"My mother and all but one of my sisters are already at the Wall, and I suspect I would have little to say to Cousin Jorah," said Lya, scowling at the turnip in her hand.

"I asked," said Wylla. "I was told that the ravens were for keeping in touch with Eastwatch and the Shadow Tower, and the rangers beyond the Wall, but if I wished to write a letter the next sister who had business in White Harbor would deliver it to my grandfather."

Collecting new recruits from the south and acting as an envoy of the Night's Watch was one of the most sought after duties there was, and given only to those sisters whose loyalty was considered beyond doubt. 

"Isn't everyone's loyalty beyond doubt once they've said the words?" Arya had asked Lyanna once; she couldn't have been more than ten, and Lyanna had merely ruffled her hair instead of answering her.

Arya sighed. She tossed a turnip into the air and caught it deftly with her other hand. "Come on," she said, "otherwise we'll be at this all day."

*

As well as counting root vegetables, they had been put to peeling potatoes and skinning game for Megga in the kitchens, and to mucking out the stables that housed the Watch's hardy garrons. They had smashed rocks and scattered buckets of the resulting gravel atop the Wall to act as traction for the sisters walking there.

They had been briefly attached to a hunting party before it became apparent that none of them had much skill with a bow, and only Lya knew enough of traps and snares to be useful.

Arya's least favourite job was in the dyers shed, where the fumes made her nose stream and her head ache terribly. Everything a sworn sister wore was black, but they did not all arrive at the Wall with only clothes of that colour; it was considered better to dye what clothes they had than let perfectly good cloth go to waste. 

The warmest thing Arya owned was a thick black cloak that had once been grey and white, and now was slightly ragged where she had picked out the stitches that had once depicted a direwolf.

"You know," Lya had told them, after skeptically sniffing her own newly dyed cloak, "they used to give a highborn woman a new black cloak when she took her vows, as though it were a wedding, and hang her maiden's cloak in the Shield Hall for remembrance."

"Why did they stop?" Wylla had asked.

It was a particularly obscure bit of Night's Watch lore, but Arya took a guess-- "Maiden's cloaks don't keep the way shields do, and don't look as impressive hanging on walls."

Lya snorted. "And there's no point in having perfectly good warm cloaks decorating walls when they could be keeping a sister warm and alive beyond the Wall."

*

In between all these other duties they were handed over to the tender mercies of the master-at-arms.

Brienne of Tarth was as tall as any swordsman Arya had ever seen, and as broad across the shoulders. In her armour - a combination of plate, ringmail, and boiled leather, all of it black - she looked larger still; and even though Arya knew there were only women at Castle Black she still took her for a man at first glance.

Brienne at first, and much to Arya's disgust, set them to sparring amongst the girls from the nursery....

There wasn't truly a nursery at Castle Black. No woman took the black unless she was old enough to make the decision freely, or old enough to be guilty of some crime that would banish her to the Wall. But there were a number of very young girls living there; they served as pages, and cupbearers, and scullery maids. Most of them would take the black once they'd grown, some of them would fly off to the south, or to the north.

A lot of them were orphans or unwanted daughters of the north who appeared or were abandoned at Castle Black, and were taken in without comment; being raised to the black, they called it. 

It was whispered that some of them were the daughters of sisters of the Night's Watch; but it was only ever said in whispers, and any sister showing undue fondness for one of the girls would quickly find herself ranging beyond the Wall or put to sea with Asha Greyjoy. 

Whatever their origins, put a wooden sword in their hands and they were fierce to the point of being feral. 

"Anklebiters," Lya Mormont called them. 

"Don't jest about it," said Wylla. "One of them actually bit me yesterday; the little monster nearly took my thumb off."

*

All three of them were unhappy, but it was Arya who steeled her nerve and confronted Brienne in the armory about them having to train with the younger girls.

"They're _children_!"

"Yes," agreed Brienne evenly.

"You're supposed to be training us, what are we going to learn fighting babies?"

"You're right," said Brienne, "that they are younger than you. You are taller, and stronger, and better trained than they are; and someday soon you may find yourself fighting someone taller, and stronger, and better trained than yourself."

"One of the girls nearly bit Wylla's thumb off," Arya found herself saying; she wasn't sure if it was an argument for or against training with them.

"Sisters of the Night's Watch have one great advantage over the wildlings, we have good steal weapons and real armour, while they most often have stone weapons and no armour at all. Most of the time that's enough, but not always."

Arya looked up at the armsmaster; her neck cricked. She had never envied Sansa her much spoken of beauty, not even when her sister had taken to calling her Arya Horseface, but she had envied Sansa's height, just as she envied Brienne's.

"I bet you never had to bite anyone's thumb off," she said. 

Brienne looked haunted for a moment before she said, "Just an ear, once." Arya would have loved to hear that story in full, but Brienne continued, "I took the black when I was eight-and-ten; I wished to be a knight, you see, and fight my enemies as bravely and honourably as any man with a Ser before his name. The first and hardest lesson I learned was that you cannot fight honourably when the odds have been stacked so very high against you, all you can do is fight."

Arya remembered Ser Rodrik teaching her and Bran the rudiments of hack-and-slash, and her frustration that however quick or skilled she was the entire thing had seemed weighted to make Bran's greater height and reach count more than had seemed fair. 

"I think I understand," she said. 

"Good," said Brienne, "but perhaps you are right, and it is time to move onto another lesson."

*

Brienne was as good as her word and spent more time training the three of them alone.

It was then that she gave Arya a ringmail shirt and told her to keep it on at all times. It was heavier than it looked, she said, and Arya must learn to move in it as lightly and freely as if she weren't wearing it.

"So much for armour being the best defense against the wildlings," Arya had grumbled under her breath. 

"You are quick as a snake, Stark," Brienne had replied. She had keener ears than Arya had counted on. "It is your best weapon, and heavy armour would only slow you down."

*

"Quick as a snake, fierce as a wolverine," Lya mocked Arya with Brienne's words later. She was in a foul mood; they all were after a full day of training with Brienne, and then arriving at the common hall only to discover that there was nothing left but thin, lukewarm soup.

Arya wanted to tackle her friend down onto the ground and rub her face in the snow; she told herself that the only reason she didn't was because there wasn't a part of her body that didn't ache. She supposed this meant that even though they hadn't yet taken their vows, Lya was truly her sister; Arya had long harbored similar impulses towards Sansa.

In any case, she supposed Lya had the most cause to be annoyed; Arya and Wylla could at least return to the Silent Tower and sleep, Lya was to spend the night on watch atop the Wall.

Arya wondered about the point of all night watches, surely it was impossible to see anything from seven hundred feet up in the dark?

The next night when it was Arya's turn to stand a watch - stupid Lya had gone off to bed _whistling_ \- she got her answer: it was _definitely_ impossible to see anything. 

It was so dark that Arya almost didn't see her watch partner until she slipped into the warming shed. She was a full sister, older than Arya by perhaps a decade with plump red cheeks in an otherwise thin and drawn face. She carried a crossbow over one shoulder, and a horn over the other. 

One blow for rangers returning, two for wildlings, three for others, Arya reminded herself. Not that they would be able to see rangers, wildlings, _or_ others. Her Aunt Lyanna could ride up to Castle Black and Arya wouldn't have a clue until the guard on the gate raised a cry. 

"I'm Kyra, by the way," her watch partner introduced herself.

"I'm--"

"Arya Stark, I know. You're the spitting image of our erstwhile ranger Lyanna Stark. And," Kyra added with a sideways smile, "I saw you once at Winterfell, you were chasing your little brother around the yard with a wooden sword."

Arya felt a sudden pang of homesickness for Winterfell, and for Bran and Rickon; truthfully, she'd had at both of them with a wooden sword at one point or another. 

"What were you doing at Winterfell? Did you live in the Winter Town, then?"

"I was a friend of Theon's," said Kyra. Then, when she realised that this didn't mean anything significant to Arya, she continued, "I worked at the brothel in the Winter Town. I was a whore."

"Oh. Um--" Arya was glad the warming sheds were dimly lit and Kyra couldn't see her blush. But she was practically a sister of the Night's Watch now, and women of the Watch did not let a little embarrassment stop them for long. "How long have you been at Castle Black?"

"Five years, ever since Lord Bolton and his sons visited Winterfell."

Arya hadn't been at home for the Warden of the North's visit five years ago. Robb and Jon had stayed, but the younger Stark children had been sent to visit their Uncle Benjen's holdfast. There had been bad blood between the Starks and the Boltons for centuries, made worse by the commonly held belief that the Boltons had leapt on Lyanna's disgrace and exile to the Wall to wrest the North away from House Stark.

Still, Arya knew this much: "Lord Bolton only has one son."

"He has one trueborn son, and one bastard. I had no father and a dirt poor mother, it was always going to be the brothel or the Wall for me; and at least in a brothel you're warm and dry, and paid more often than not."

"What changed?"

Even in the shadows cast by their single flickering flame Kyra's face seemed to darken, and her fingers twitched in the direction of her crossbow. "Ramsey Snow. I begged a horse of Theon to get me to Castle Black, and I couldn't take my vows quickly enough once I got here. The bastard had forgotten me already by the time he woke, I suppose. But just in case-- even the son of the Warden of the North cannot compel a sworn sister to renege on her vows."

Arya slipped out of the shed to give Kyra a moment to compose herself. She carefully made her way to the edge and looked down into the bottomless dark, remembering something her aunt had told her about the sworn sisters, how they all had different reasons for coming to the Wall.

Brienne of Tarth had taken the black because it was the closest thing to knighthood available to her; Kyra was haunted by the memory of the bastard of the Dreadfort; Aunt Lyanna, wherever she was now, was an exiled traitor to the realm. 

Arya had first come to the Wall out of a misguided girlhood dream, and she would stay and take her vows because she was already starting to think of these women - not just Lya and Wylla, but the ones she knew little or liked less - as sisters.


	4. Vows

Arya's weapon of choice was Needle, of course, but her own sword would not do for sparring practice. She didn't want to hurt Wylla Manderly, not really, even though they were living in close quarters, always cold and often hungry, and the only reason they weren't constantly at each other's throats was that sometimes they teamed up to quarrel with Lya Mormont.

Arya had a Braavosi blade with a dulled edge to practiced with, courtesy of Brienne. The light, narrow blade favoured the quick, darting fighting style that she'd adopted to compensate for her lack of reach or brute strength.

Wylla's first choice of weapon was the spear. As a child in White Harbor she had first learned to fight with a trident. 

Arya had scoffed when Wylla told her this. "A trident isn't a weapon."

"It is when you grow up at the Merman's Court, and you have an older sister who's forever teasing you." Wylla had a fair point, there. If there had been a trident to hand when Sansa had started calling her Arya Horseface, Arya probably would have made good use of it, too. 

Wylla had not a little skill with the spear. "If this Night's Watch thing doesn't work out," she'd said, "I think I might have a future as a spearwife." 

It had only been half a jest; Wylla would no sooner turn her cloak and go over to the wildlings than Arya or Lya would, but if there was one thing they could all agree on, it was that it was long past time for them to be permitted to take their vows.

Even if Wylla had been armed with a sword rather than a spear, her reach would still have been greater than Arya's. Brienne was fond of mismatches when she set them to sparring; she said it was the best way to learn and improve. And it was true that Wylla was not so quick as Arya, especially not when armed with the unwieldy spear. 

It did mean that Arya spent the opening exchanges dancing out of the way of Wylla's jabs, watching and waiting for an opening. 

Arya had reluctantly accepted that, as she was approaching seven-and-ten, she probably wasn't going to get any taller. And Brienne counseled patience in a fight. "Your opponents will underestimate you because of your size. They will try to finish you quickly lest it be said that a slight girl tested them in battle, and when they overextend themselves, that is your chance..."

It was good advice, and for the most part Arya managed to follow it. But she did spend so much of her practice fights dancing and weaving that she thought her footwork must be the equal of any knight in the kingdoms.

Arya feinted right, then twisted and made a lunge for Wylla's undefended side. Wylla saw the move and brought her spear across-- even with its blunted point, the spear sheared through Arya's quilted armour, and through the flesh and muscle of her forearm. 

Arya blinked. She watched the blood well up through the ripped fabric. She tried to keep her grip on her practice blade, but she could no longer feel her fingers and she watched curiously as the hilt slipped from her hand. 

Wylla swore blasphemously on at least three of the Seven; she wadded up the bottom of her cloak and pressed it against Arya's bloody forearm.

Brienne was alerted by Wylla's frantic oaths. She frowned at Arya's arm, and pursed her lips over her crooked teeth. "You'd better take her to see the maester, Manderly," she said. 

As Arya let Wylla herd her away from the training yard she thought that she hadn't yet had cause to visit the Castle Black maester. And women still weren't allowed to study at the Citadel, were they? So this maester, was she some learned woman from across the Narrow Sea, or a sister of the Night's Watch who had been a Septa or a midwife before taking the black, and had some knowledge of healing? 

On their way to the Rookery they ran across Lya just coming out of the Common Hall. She looked at Arya's bloody arm and said, "Gods, I knew you two were quarrelling, but I didn't think it was about to get violent."

"It was a training accident," said Wylla, and she looked so stricken that Arya gave her the best grin she could muster and said, "'Course it was, and I'll be quicker next time."

"I can take her to the maester, if you like?" Lya offered. "I know her a bit. She's the one who's been training me with the bow." 

Like all the Mormonts, Lya had been trained in the use of the mace and the axe, but at Castle Black she'd turned out to have a keen eye and a talent for the double-curved bow. Brienne was a knight - well, as good as a knight, anyway - and as such she knew little of archery. 

Wylla dragged her hand through her long hair, which had been growing out and was now equal parts sickly green and her natural dirty blonde. "Yeah, thanks."

Lya took Arya's uninjured arm and walked with her to the Rookery. A woman came down the steps to meet them. She was young, with fine golden hair and innocent blue eyes, but that was as far as her prettiness went; her nose and jaw looked like they'd been badly broken at some point and never healed properly.

Arya frowned through the pain and wondered if this was the maester-cum-archery master? The woman held her hands, drowned in overlong sleeves, over her mouth and said something mushy, broken sounding and completely incomprehensible.

But Lya nodded and said, "Yeah, fetch Sarella. Thanks, Pia."

*

"Is that real?" Arya asked. 

The woman who had emerged to usher Arya and Lya into her chambers had a widow's peak and the dark skin of a Summer Islander; and she wore a maester's chain with links of copper, silver, and black iron over her sleek black furs.

"Yes, completely real."

"I thought they didn't let women study to become maesters," said Arya as Sarella peeled torn fabric away to reveal a bloody gouge out of Arya's forearm. 

"They do if they don't know that you're a woman," said Sarella with a grin. "You're lucky, this is deep but you haven't damaged any tendons or lost too much blood. I'll have to clean it, though. Pia, how's that boiling wine coming along? Young Mormont, would you--?" 

Arya found herself bundled into bearlike embrace by Lya. The other girl wasn't much taller than Arya, but she was built along the same lines as her mother, squat and solid. 

"Wha--?" Arya began, but then the maester poured boiling wine over her wounded arm and she bit her lip hard and tried not to fight against Lya's hold.

As her wound was stitched and then wrapped in clean white linens Arya distracted herself from the discomfort by looking around Sarella's chambers. The parts of it that weren't given over to assorted bows and half-fletched arrows were given over to books and scrolls, like the ones Maester Luwin had back at Winterfell.

"And you're truly a maester?"

"Maester Sarella, here to serve the Night's Watch. Although, I trained under the name Alleras." Sarella grinned at Arya, seeing that Arya had quickly worked out that the alias was only her name reversed. "I thought myself clever in those days."

"And now?" Arya asked. 

"I studied at the citadel, forged my chain, and learned enough to realise how little I truly knew. When the conclave discovered the truth of my identity they offered me a choice, either they would take my chain, or I could take the black and serve as the first true maester of the Night's Watch in a hundred years. To this day I'm not sure if it was meant as a punishment or a great opportunity." She finished binding Arya's arm. "Right, you'll live." 

"Thank you," said Arya, hopping to her feet. "Oh, and I'm Arya Stark."

"I know," said Sarella, "you look just like--"

"I know, I look just like my Aunt Lyanna." Arya frowned. "Only shorter."

*

"What's the problem with the girl?" Arya asked Lya as they wandered back towards the Silent Tower.

Lya frowned. "Who, Sarella?"

Arya held her gloved hands over her mouth and mumbled incoherently. Lya gave a bark of laughter, then coughed, and bumped Arya's shoulder with her own.

"That's Pia, and don't be horrible. It's a sad story, I heard that she was some kind of servant at Harrenhal when the Ironborn tried to take it; she got taken by a group of soldiers to be shared between them, and it was their captain who smashed her face and knocked out half her teeth for talking too much."

"How'd she end up here?"

Lya shrugged. "Nowhere else to go. The King gave Harrenhal to Prince Viserys, and he didn't want anyone who'd collaborated with the Ironborn there."

Arya immediately decided that she disliked this Prince Viserys. "Bit of a strange definition of collaboration."

"Sarella says that Castle Black is the best place for her; no men. She'd be a liability in a battle, of course, but so long as she's left alone in the Rookery to tend to her birds she's happy enough."

Arya shuddered. She was thinking of her watch partner, Kyra, as well as Pia. "Seven Hells, and to think my mother was worried about me being in danger at the Wall..."

"There'll be danger enough once we take out vows," said Lya.

*

Wylla wasn't in the Silent Tower when Arya and Lya returned, it was her turn to stand an all night watch. But on Arya's bed they found a pair of steel vambraces that Wylla must have dug out from the pile of ill-matched armour that the sisters equipped themselves from.

And just like that, their quarrels were forgotten.

*

The three girls broke their fast in the Common Hall together the next morning.

Arya was wondering if her arm was going to scar. Her Aunt Lyanna had a scar on her shoulder where a wildling's axe had cut her practically to the bone; the scar and the story that went with it had horrified Jon and Sansa, for different reasons, but had at various times delighted Robb, Arya and Bran, and Rickon. Although, now she was at the Wall herself, Arya found the story decidedly less glamorous. 

"Ah, just the people I was looking for," called Kyra, wending her way through the crowded hall and stopping at their bench. As always, when Arya saw Kyra indoors she thought that the older woman looked uncomfortable and lopsided without her crossbow. 

"Why?" Wylla asked suspiciously. Usually when one of the full sisters sought them out it was because they had thought of some particularly tedious or unpleasant duty to dump on the girls who hadn't yet taken their vows. 

"The Lady Commander's steward has been taken ill; she needs someone to fill in for a few days."

Lya slouched down on her bench, and looked like she'd prefer to be under the table. Wylla shrugged and said, "So send a couple of the anklebiters."

Kyra reached out and rapped her knuckles on top of Wylla's head. "She's the _Lady Commander_ , idiot, she needs someone who knows their letters. And as you three are all fine highborn folk..."

Arya looked across at Lya, who was desperately trying to avoid making eye contact with Kyra, and said, "I'll go." She held up her injured arm and added, "I doubt Brienne will let me train until this is healed, anyway."

*

Arya spent the next week squiring for Lady Maege; just like Bran was squiring for Uncle Blackfish in Riverrun, she thought. 

She fetched the morning's messages from Pia in the Rookery, doubled back via the Common Hall to collect the Lady Commander's breakfast (ham and black bread) and then picked her way over to the Lord Commander's Tower.

She opened any messages that weren't marked for the Lady Commander's eyes only while Lady Maege broke her fast.

Today there was a message from Wenda, who commanded at the Shadow Tower. Arya had felt a jolt of excitement when she'd first realised that this Wenda was none other than Wenda the White Fawn, of the Kingswood Brotherhood. That Wenda had been a childhood hero of Arya's as she'd run around Winterfell pretending to shoot her brothers with imaginary arrows, much to her mother's dismay; Lady Catelyn considered a convicted bandit an even less fitting person for a young girl's hero worship that Rhaenyra Targaryen. 

Arya frowned at Wenda's message; both because of the terrible hand that it was written in, rumour had it that Wenda had only learned her letters after taking the black, and because of the message itself. 

"The Shadow Tower reports no news of Mya Stone, my lady." Which meant no news of Arya's Aunt Lyanna, either. 

Lady Maege caught Arya's eye and said heartily, "There's no point in worrying yet, Mya and your aunt are both fine rangers. Anything else?"

"Asha Greyjoy writes to inform you that Eastwatch is under-garrisoned," Arya reported.

Lady Maege grumbled under her breath and said, "I'll send her some more women when the next batch of recruits take their vows, that will include you, Stark." Arya all but quivered where she stood. "Your friend with the green hair, Manderly, is it? And my Lyanna, will say their words too."

"She prefers to be called Lya," Arya corrected automatically, and then wished she'd bitten her tongue. The Lady Commander didn't mind Arya speaking freely in her presence, but this wasn't Watch business, this was family. "Um, my lady."

Lady Maege leaned back and regarded Arya carefully. "I met your aunt when she was young; she was a pretty, willful fool, the stupidity with Rhaegar and her bastard proved that well enough, but I never thought her a traitor, and I wanted the whole north to know it. Still, it cannot have been an easy name for my youngest daughter to grow up under..."

"Do you still think my aunt a fool?" Arya asked.

Lady Maege snorted. "I have nothing but respect for Lyanna Stark as a sister of the Night's Watch and First Ranger of Castle Black." Arya couldn't help but notice that it wasn't an answer, but before she could dig herself in further by saying so the Lady Commander dismissed her. "Go, and tell your friends that you will all take your vows on the next morning."

*

The gossip that they were to take their vows in the morning spread through Castle Black like the bloody flux. 

"You could still make a run for it in the night," Megga said gloomily, as she ladled them out three slightly larger than usual servings of stew. 

They were called individually to the Rookery to see Sarella so that the maester could tell them to which duties they would be assigned after taking their vows. 

Tall Wylla Manderly with her spear was assigned to the nomadic guard who garrisoned each of the Night's Watch abandoned forts by turn. She would leave first for Icemark. Lya Mormont was to stay at Castle Black and would by turns lend her bow to the hunting parties that helped to feed the Watch, and her axe to those builders who were attempting to hack back the Haunted Forest where it was encroaching on the Wall.

Arya was to go to Eastwatch-by-the-Sea, to serve under Asha Greyjoy as a ranger and scout. She was pleased with the assignment, but part of her had been hoping to be sent to the Shadow Tower...

"Because of Wenda the White Fawn?" asked Lya, who had shared Arya's childhood fascination with the famed bandit.

"My grandfather says that you should never meet heroes or kings, you'll only end up disappointed," Wylla put in.

All three of them were packing their belongs, Arya and Wylla to go to Eastwatch and Icemark; Lya was moving half a hundred yards away into the Flint Barracks, she said there was no point in her rattling around the Silent Tower on her own."

Lya cleared her throat awkwardly. "The Gods know I've wanted to hang both of you from the top of the Wall by your thumbs at times..." she trailed off.

Arya crossed the room to Lya and bumped her shoulder affectionately against the other girl's. "I couldn't have done it without you either, stupid."

Wylla made a mock gagging sound, and Lya threw a baldric at her. "Yes, okay," she conceded, "I would have turned tail for White Harbor before the first week was out if it hadn't been for you two. Happy now?"

*

They dressed in their finest, their _blackest_ clothes. Arya polished and sharpened Needle and hung the sword from her hip; she polished her vambraces and ringmail shirt, too.

Brienne and Kyra were to escort Arya and Lya to the heart tree beyond the Wall to say their vows; Wylla looked towards the Sept for a long lingering moment before she said, "No, we came to the Wall together, we should say our vows together."

Their party was mounting up by the gate when a watcher on the Wall blew her horn, just once... one blast meant rangers returning. 

The gates were - slowly, painfully, creaking and groaning with every inch - opened, and Lyanna Stark and Mya Stone walked their mounts through the tunnel under the ice. 

Arya's Aunt Lyanna appeared whole, apart from what looked like a swollen bite mark along her jaw. Before, Arya would not have been able to stop herself from demanding the story behind it at once, but there would be time enough for Lyanna to tell her later, once Arya had said her vows and they were both sisters of the Night's Watch.

"You're saying your vows today?" Lyanna asked, dismounting.

Arya nodded mutely, then managed to indicate Wylla and Lya. "All of us, before the heart tree."

"I'll come," said Lyanna. "I'll need a new horse, I fear I have ridden this one to exhaustion."

A steward was sent to the stables for a fresh mount for the first ranger. Lyanna gripped Arya's shoulder and said, "I'm proud of you, as would Ned be."

Mya Stone rolled her eyes, hoisted the leather bag that she'd dropped at her feet when she'd dismounted and said, "I guess I'll take the Weeper's head to the Lady Commander by myself, then."

As excited as they all were to say their vows, Arya, Wylla, and Lya all found their attention diverted by the severed head of the infamous wildling raider and raper, in a bag swinging jauntily from Mya Stone's hand.

*

Arya would have said that the heart tree in Winterfell's godswood was the oldest living thing in the world; that was before she saw the heart tree in the Haunted Forest. 

Even Wylla and Brienne of Tarth, who didn't follow the Old Gods, fell gravely silent in its presence.

Arya Stark, Wylla Manderly, and Lya Mormont knelt in the snow before the tree and in three voices knittend together into one they said, "Night gathers, and now my watch begins. It shall not end until my death. I shall take no husband and bear no children. I shall wear no gowns and no jewels. I shall live and die at my post. I am the sword in the darkness. I am the watcher on the walls. I am the shield that guards the realms of men. I pledge my life's blood to the Night's Watch, for this night and all the nights to come."

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [The Sisters Black [PODFIC]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/5969514) by [Opalsong](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Opalsong/pseuds/Opalsong)




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